HL2 CTF Interview

The good people at HL2CTF were good enough to give us a really good interview.
Interviews
HL2CTF INTERVIEW
1. First of all, have you had any previous experiance with any HL mods?
Valtrain: We've never done any HL mods before. We did a Quake3 mod a
while back ( www.planetquake.com/gridiron/ ) that was basically
football with rocketlaunchers, so we...

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Published by Jaboo224 on 2005-03-06 21:19:16 , last updated 2017-10-08 14:01:06

The good people at HL2CTF were good enough to give us a really good interview.

Interviews

HL2CTF INTERVIEW

1. First of all, have you had any previous experiance with any HL mods?

Valtrain: We've never done any HL mods before. We did a Quake3 mod awhile back ( www.planetquake.com/gridiron/ ) that was basicallyfootball with rocketlaunchers, so we've had some experience moddingbefore just not with HL.

2. What inspired you to start this mod?

Valtrain: Both Doom3 and HL2 came out with no multiplayer CTF gamemode. We couldn't imagine not playing CTF, so we decided to start up aCTF mod. We looked at Doom3 and HL2, and decided HL2 was better suitedfor multiplayer, so here we are. It's just as well, I think id is nowpaying the 3wave guys to do a Doom3 CTF game.

Menthol: And it didn't hurt that the development tools for HL2 arereally great, Valve really went out of their way to produce a reallygreat SDK for mod developers.

3. How many people are making this mod? (mappers, coders, ect.)

Valtrain: Well, I'm the only coder. My partner in crime from the Q3Gridiron days, Menthol, is also working on maps and media. We'vegotten a lot of great community support for this mod so far, andseveral of the community maps are now included as official maps. We'reincluding maps from keved, own3r, MagicTMP, RipeX, Trivium, andKingNic.

Menthol: We just got the ball rolling. It really has become acommunity effort and quite frankly to our suprise since we're so newto the HL community.

4. Has anyone from the community given assistance in comming up with ideas?

Valtrain: Of course! We've got some very active forums with some veryvocal people on them. Feedback from the fans is helping to shape thedirection that this mod takes, and we're really excited by all thefeedback we've gotten so far.

Menthol: When we first talked about taking on Capture the Flag forHL2, opposed to our taking on a totally original mod concept, we knewthat the community could not be left out of the mix. It's been greatfinding people chatting about the old days of Zoid's Threewave CTF forQuake. The community behind the mod, as far as we can tell, is alsovery diverse (not just HL players) and it's really helping to getinput from all of them.

5. What do you think of the people who dislike your mod?

Valtrain: It's not for everyone. What we really appreciate are thepeople who post on the forums telling us why they don't like it, thatshow we improve the game.

Menthol: It's true, we recently went over some feedback from a playerin a strictly deathmatch clan whose suggestions have influenced how weare going to handle competition modes in one of our upcoming updates.We try to listen to everyone within reason.

6. What about the fans?

Valtrain: The community support we've gotten so far is really awesome!We've got a very active mapping community, we've got a lot of players,we just recently hosted our "CTF match against Valve" night where alot of fans got to play CTF against a team from Valve. We couldn't doit without the fans, that's what keeps us going.

7. What was it like having members of Valve compete with you on your own mod?

Valtrain: It was insane! We had a lot of fun, I think they had a lotof fun, the fans had a lot of fun, and we'd love to do it again! Itwas really nice of Valve to post the news in Steam to help us get theword out about the mod, we've had a steady influx of new players sincethen.

Menthol: I have to say that I really thought this wouldn't happen, wehad only just released an alpha and everything in the mod we had donewas in testing stages. When they showed up in our IRC channel andValtrain said "Eric Johnson is with Valve" I was rather blown away tosay the least.

8. Have they talked about contributing in any way?

Menthol: I think their showing up alone was a tremendous contribution,it's just rare to have the creators take notice of your efforts.

Valtrain: In addition to showing up, they've given us a lot of goodfeedback for what else we can improve.

9. What are your oppinions about TFC 2 or other CTF mods?

Valtrain: TF2 looks really cool, I can't wait to play it! FortressForever and Weapons Factory are both coming along well, and I expectthey'll bereleasing public versions before long. What these games all sufferfrom though is that they're all the same "CTF with classes" style ofplay. One of the things that I think makes HL2CTF different from thosegames is that we have no player classes, our game is a simplefast-paced run and gun homage to the old school CTF games.

Menthol: I for one have been a great fan of Team Fortress and lookforward to many of the mods coming out for HL2, but I have to say, at4 o'clock in the morning, I just wanna frag and cap!

10. Why do you think HL2: Deathmatch is so unpopular with steam users?

Valtrain: I didn't know it was unpopular, its always got loads ofpeople playing it! I think if anything, gamers are just tired ofstraight up deathmatch and want some variety. I think HL2DM might havebeen disappointing in that after the initial cool factor of "I canthrow toilets around" wore off, it was just same old same olddeathmatch.

11. Do you think you could change this image?

Valtrain: Well again, I don't think HL2DM is that unpopular. We'rejust here to give players another option.

Menthol: I agree, right now there's 1,658 players on 1,101 HL2Deathmatch servers. Though eclipsed by Counter-Strike, it's still avery popular mode of play with the community. If players feeldeathmatch is getting old, I too see CTF as another option. Back whenwe were developing Gridiron for Quake3, once some of the best Q3Deathmatch players starting showing up on the servers the competitionin the games really stepped up a notch. It seems that some really goodDM players are showing up on the servers making this same thing happenin CTF. Games are more competative than ever and we're only in betaright now.

12. What kind of updates are you planning for the future?

Valtrain: We've got loads of new stuff coming! We're planning to add alot of the competitive features that many clans are asking for tobetter facilitate matches and ladders. We're planning on adding a lotof new maps and improving the maps we have now. We're planning to addsome alternate game modes (Stopwatch, 1 Flag CTF, carry the flag backto base, etc) that I think people will really like.

13. Can you explain the Grappling Hook being talked about on the forums?

Valtrain: Some people on the forums have been asking about thepossibility of including a grappling hook. Nothing definite has beendecided on thisyet, and we're exploring ways to have movement enhancing items withoutusing the traditional grappling hook.

Menthol: This is such a terribly torn subject. Back when the grapplewas first introduced, players complained, but those same players woulduse the grapple and use it well, maybe too well and to the detrimentof the game. But the same players that just finished "yelling" aboutit could be found hanging from the ceiling over the flag ready topummel you with a barrage of rockets. I sometimes look at thegrappling hook as some sort of villain in a story. In the story of CTFthat's exactly what it is. But I digress, in the story of Half-Life,it sure seems plausible that the Rebels would have a grapple. But thisstill does not address competative CTF and fairness in the game. So,wanting to involve the community as we do, a poll we have on thewebsite is very close between "Hate it" and "Limit its use and I couldlive with it" so it's leaning really strong towards 'no grapple' inHL2 CTF.

14. Do you plan on adding something that has not been seen an aversion of Capture the Flag before?

Valtrain: We'll have to see where our game evolves. We don't want torepeat the TFC-style player classes thing, we want to bring back theold school CTF feel and we'll see where that takes us.

Menthol: I agree. We see the mod as staying 'Classic CTF' and we wishnot to stray from that.

15. How long do you plan on working to better this mod?

Valtrain: As long as people are still playing it, we'll keep making it better.

16. How much time a day would you say you work on this?

Valtrain: Too much :) I'd say between reading the forums, respondingto email, and actively working on the mod that I'd average 3-4 hours aday.

Menthol: Ever heard of a beach bum? Since HL2 came out I've become a"mod bum" ... I see the Sun on television, it is still out there isn'tit? :)

17. What is the best way to support your mod?

Valtrain: To borrow a marketing slogan, if you love the mod tell afriend. If you don't, tell us. We use the forums as our primary sourceof feedback, and we're relying on word of mouth to get the word out.

Menthol: Play and comment, play and comment!

18. Have any other mods talked about joining in anyway?

Valtrain: We're talking to a few other mod teams about collaboratingon some things, but nothing definite yet.

19. What is the best way to get in contact with the HL2ctf Staff?

Valtrain: Either forums or email. If you email, don't feel bad if Idon't respond immediately, I've got a flood of mail coming in and ittakes some time to respond.

Menthol: We have email links under the "team page" on the website, butthe forums really are the best way.

20. Any last words to your fans?

Valtrain: We want to give a HUGE thanks to everyone that's helped usout along the way. We couldn't do it without you guys!

Menthol: Eventually I will cap your flag. eventually. :)

For more information about hl2 ctf please visit there website at hl2ctf.com

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